down the road; and by the time I
had come as far as the manse, the blackbirds were whistling in the
garden lilacs, and the mist that hung around the valley in the time of
the dawn was beginning to arise and die away.

Mr. Campbell, the minister of Essendean, was waiting for me by the
garden gate, good man! He asked me if I had breakfasted; and hearing
that I lacked for nothing, he took my hand in both of his and clapped it
kindly under his arm.

"Well, Davie lad," said he, "I will go with you as far as the ford, to
set you on the way."

And we began to walk forward in silence.

"Are ye sorry to leave Essendean?" said he, after a while.

"Why, sir," said I, "if I knew where I was going, or what was likely to
become of me, I would tell you candidly. Essendean is a good place
indeed, and I have been very happy there; but then I have never been
anywhere else. My father and mother, since they are both dead, I shall
be no nearer to in Essendean than in the Kingdom of Hungary; and, to
speak truth, if I thought I had a chance to better myself where I was
going I would go with a good will."

"Ay?" said Mr. Campbell. "Very well, Davie. Then it behoves me to tell
your fortune; or so far as I may. When your mother was gone, and your
father (the worthy, Christian man) began to sicken for his end, he gave
me in charge a certain letter, which he said was your inheritance. 'So
soon,' says he, 'as I am gone, and the house is redd up and the gear
disposed of' (all which, Davie, hath been done), 'give my boy this
letter into his hand, and start him off to the house of Shaws, not far
from Cramond. That is the place I came from,' he said, 'and it's where
it befits that my boy should return. He is a steady lad,' your father
said, 'and a canny goer; and I doubt not he will come safe, and be well
liked where he goes.'"

"The house of Shaws!" I cried. "What had my poor father to do with the
house of Shaws?"

"Nay," said Mr. Campbell, "who can tell that for a surety? But the name
of that family, Davie boy, is the name you bear--Balfours of Shaws: an
ancient, honest, reputable house, peradventure in these latter days
decayed. Your father, too, was a man of learning as befitted his
position; no man more plausibly conducted school; nor had he the manner
or the speech of a common dominie; but (as ye will yourself remember) I
took aye a pleasure to have him to the manse to meet the gentry; and
those of my own house, Campbell of Kilrennet, C